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Contents lists

T. E. Lawrence to E. M. Forster

26. 4. 26

I broke my right arm
and wrist trying to start someone's car. It has been
a source of discomfort since, and is not perfectly cured. In fact it's
twisted a bit. No matter: but it takes away my last hope of being
admitted some day to a beauty chorus.

At last, after weeks, I have found Lucas' letter, somewhat crumpled, for
I carried it about with me for a while. His sentence about 'a
supernatural background' startled me. Perhaps he meant unworldly: or
unearthly. Surely not supernatural? I do not believe in that. There is
no more rational being than myself alive. It's excess of reason which
makes me seem mad to people. Otherwise I've now digested the letter, and
can read it coldly, unblushingly. Odd that my confidence in my critical
sense should let me condemn as rotten what so many excellent artists
praise. I may see Lucas on May 9: and will then try to pin him down to
particularities.

Your letter after Lincoln stares me reproachfully in the face. What can
I say or do? I have a shell on me like a crab's: so I can't show what I
think. It's my opinion that you will yet write (or have written and not
yet shown) something very big: bigger than the Passage, which
deliberately was bigger than any of the previous novels. Greatness lies
in the eye that contemplates not in the subject: and your eye has grown
very slowly. All the more lasting, thereby. Of course it's a bore being
famous. You have cracked the crib, and the swag isn't any longer up to
your standard. Consequently you feel empty, for the while: as if the
profession was exhausted. But it isn't. Just wait a bit. Ten more years
if necessary. You aren't wasting your time: everybody likes seeing you.
Your present emotions span themselves into articles for the Labour
Leader. Very well. There are sparks and flames:
affairs of degree. Yours are the most sporting and fiery sparks. They are
so good that someone will some day collect a shower of them. You needn't
do that. Let the Passage represent you for the moment.

Do you remember little Smith, the bearded bookseller of Lincoln? He
asked who you were. I told him, feeling pretty pleased
with myself. He ordered a dozen assorted E.M.F's. (5/- brand) on the
strength of your visit. Sold them. Ordered 20. Is selling them. I told
him The Omnibus was a book. He ordered two. A Yank came in: guessed he
wanted something to read. Saw The Omnibus. Said 'That’s the best
set of short stories ever printed'
and took the two.

I don't endorse the Y's opinion. V.G. yes... but the best? No, I don't
agree. However my critical judgement, though dogmatic and dictatorial, is
(according to Lucas) bad. Hoots. I congratulate you, anyway.

This letter must stop. Pen-holding is a small scale business,
and makes my
wrist ache: and there are many letters to write.

Writing is a mean snivelling business. It fails to convey anything
bigger than its own scrawling miserable pot-hooks.

Hoots.

T.E.

Source:

DG 496-7

Checked:

jw/

Last revised:

27 January 2006

T. E. Lawrence chronology

﻿

1888 16 August: born
at Tremadoc, Wales

1896-1907: City of Oxford High School for Boys

1907-9: Jesus College, Oxford, B.A., 1st Class Hons, 1909

1910-14: Magdalen College, Oxford (Senior Demy), while working at the British
Museum's excavations at Carchemish

1915-16: Military Intelligence Dept, Cairo

1916-18: Liaison Officer with the Arab Revolt

1919: Attended the Paris Peace Conference

1919-22: wrote Seven Pillars of Wisdom

1921-2: Adviser on Arab Affairs to Winston Churchill at the Colonial Office

1922 August: Enlisted in the Ranks of the RAF

1923 January: discharged from the RAF

1923 March: enlisted in the Tank Corps

1923: translated a French novel, The Forest Giant

1924-6: prepared the subscribers' abridgement of Seven Pillars of Wisdom

1927-8: stationed at Karachi, then Miranshah

1927 March: Revolt in the Desert, an abridgement of Seven
Pillars, published

1928: completed The Mint, began translating Homer's Odyssey

1929-33: stationed at Plymouth

1931: started working on RAF boats

1932: his translation of the Odyssey published

1933-5: attached to MAEE, Felixstowe

1935 February: retired from the RAF

1935 19 May: died from injuries received in a motor-cycle crash on 13 May

1935 21 May: buried at Moreton, Dorset

﻿

This T. E. Lawrence Studies website is edited and maintained by
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